This is the first part of a series of three stories in photos about life in Nabi Saleh during Ramadan. Click here to see the second part and here to see the third part.
The atmosphere was friendly and festive in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh, which holds weekly Friday protests against the Israeli occupation. Warm July evenings ushered in the end of the village’s summer camp for youth, just before the month of Ramadan began. Wearing shirts emblazoned with the face of Mustafa Tamimi, a local who was shot in the face by a tear gas canister from a short range distance and killed last December, the children participated in games, singing and dancing competitions.
Unfortunately, the underlying presence of the Israeli army and the, illegal according to the international law, Halamish settlement built on Nabi Saleh land foreshadowed that the village was not going to have a peaceful Ramadan, as demonstrated by the frequent early dawn raids throughout the week by the Israeli occupation army and the arrests it carried out. For the villagers, they have come to recognize that no matter what time of the year it is, the agitated and hostile atmosphere has become a staple of their daily lives.